Ice Cream, Anyone?

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Date of Publication Oct. 2004

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Ice Cream, Anyone?

 

The average American consumes 24 quarts of ice cream every year. He

thinks he is only eating cream, sugar, and vanilla. But he is

actually putting a lot of very strange things into his body.

 

There are over 1,400 flavorings, stabilizers, colors, and

emulsifiers available to the commercial producer of ice cream.

 

Unfortunately, ice cream manufacturers are not required by law to

list the additives used in making their product. As a result, most

ice creams are synthetic from start to finish.

 

Ice cream makers are giving us a wide variety of delicious flavors,

but are they fit to eat?

 

There is hardly any ice cream flavor that does not have a chemical

substitute. Some of the artificial flavors are potent poisons which

are powerful enough to cause liver, kidney, and heart disease.

 

Some ice creams contain natural flavorings; some contain a mixture

of natural and artificial flavors, and some are entirely

artificially flavored. The artificial flavors are favored by the

manufacturers because, since they cost less, the profit is

increased.

 

For example, consider " vanilla " : Category I is commercial vanilla

flavoring made entirely of vanilla. Category II is a combination of

natural and artificial flavors; and the package may read, " vanilla

flavored. " Category III is entirely artificial; and the label may

read, " artificially flavored vanilla. "

 

What is in artificial vanilla flavoring? It is peperonal or

vanillin. Peperonal is a chemical used to kill lice. Vanillin is

made from the wastes of wood pulp and has no relationship to the

vanilla bean.

 

Natural vanilla (which is pureed vanilla beans or vanilla extract)

is much more expensive than artificial vanilla. Today it is only

rarely found in the ice cream you buy at the store.

 

Then there is strawberry flavor. How nice fresh, ripe strawberries

taste! But in your dish of " strawberry " ice cream, you will find

benzyl acetate—a synthetic chemical that tastes like strawberries.

 

According to the Merck Index, an encyclopedia for chemists, this

substance is extremely dangerous and can cause vomiting and

diarrhea. It is a nitrate solvent.

 

Would you rather have pineapple flavoring in your ice cream? Ethyl

acetate is used to give that flavor. It can cause liver, kidney, and

heart damage. It is also used as a cleaner for leather and textiles.

Its vapors have been known to cause chronic lung, liver, and heart

damage.

 

What about banana flavoring? It is amylbutyrate, which is also used

as an oil paint solvent.

 

Cherries anyone? Aldehydec 17 is used to provide the cherry flavor

in your ice cream. This is an inflammable liquid which is used as

aniline dyes, and the manufacture of plastic and rubber.

 

Perhaps nuts is what you want in your ice cream? Butraldehyde is the

chemical used to provide the nut flavoring in ice cream. It is one

of the ingredients in rubber cement.

 

The problem is that nearly all our artificial food flavors and food

colors—come from coal tar! This is a substance in coal and also

petroleum. We would never think of putting coal or gasoline in our

bodies; yet that is what is put into all the processed food which

contains, what the label calls " pure food colors " or " artificial

flavorings. " Coal tar is notorious as a causative agent in producing

cancers of the stomach, bowel, kidney, liver, and other organs.

 

Back in the old days, fresh eggs would be added to ice cream as an

emulsifier, to make it more textured. Today diethyl glycol is used

instead. This is the same chemical used in antifreeze and paint

removers. Like all the other chemicals, it is dangerous. You do not

want even small amounts of these chemicals in your body. According

to the Merck Index, it is sufficiently toxic to cause liver and

kidney damage.

 

Stabilizers make ice cream smooth; and emulsifiers make it stiff, so

it can retain air. Here are some of the chemicals used to stabilize

and emulsify the ice cream you eat:

 

Propylene glycol (also used in antifreeze), glycerin, sodium

carboxyl methylcellulose, monoglycerides, diglycerides, disodium

phosphates, tetrasodium pyrophosphate, polysorbate 80, and dioctyl

sodium sulfosuccinate.

 

Government regulations permit all these things to be placed in your

ice cream.

 

Last but not least, ice cream makers pump air into the product.

Homemade ice cream weighs 7 to 8½ pounds per gallon. Store-bought

ice cream weighs 4.5 pounds or less. So you are paying a lot for a

smaller amount of cream; but you are still getting a heavy dose of

chemical additives. Is it really worth it?

 

The next time you are tempted by a nice-looking banana split, think

of it as a mixture of oil and nitrate solvent, antifreeze, and lice

killer.

_________________

JoAnn Guest

mrsjoguest

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